


Liquid Flux

by DesdemonaKaylose, neveralarch



Series: Banners from the Turrets [21]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Asexual Character, Empurata, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, One Shot Collection, Rope Bondage, Side Story, Sticky Sexual Interfacing, Valve Oral (Transformers), toxic robot masculinity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:27:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25391620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesdemonaKaylose/pseuds/DesdemonaKaylose, https://archiveofourown.org/users/neveralarch/pseuds/neveralarch
Summary: Side stories for Banners from the Turrets, including such curiosities as:Megatron and Rung swing with ImpactorEmpurata AU Starscream and Rung have a deeply unhealthy relationshipOld Man Megatron breaks his fucking hipJazz and Prowl do BondageAs you can see these really are just whatever the hell we want to do. But you're welcome to them if you're into that.
Relationships: Impactor/Megatron (Transformers), Jazz/Prowl, Megatron/Rung/Starscream (Transformers), Rung/Starscream (Transformers)
Series: Banners from the Turrets [21]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1265390
Comments: 142
Kudos: 173





	1. Aint No High Toned Woman Make Me Walk the Line

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was talking about Megatron/Impactor/Rung with some people in a discord and RH was very interested in seeing it, so I did a little scribbling. Then I asked Nev what they wanted to see, and it ended up being. This. Despite my intentions Rung ended up being a sassy little dom so if someone wants to see him being tender with Impactor they’re just going to have to write that themselves. My apologies.  
> Fic spins off from Broke My Last Glass Jaw although it is not at all canon to that timeline.
> 
> Or: I Heard Yall Like Cuck Rung

It was the last question Impactor expected to be asked over dessert jellies in the parlor of his ex’s new conjunx, even though the subject had been hanging over the entire night like a warship in low orbit.

“You used to be intimate, didn’t you?” Rung said. “You and Megatron?”

Megatron, in the broad cushioned chair across from Impactor, froze with his nightcap of engex against his mouth.

Impactor switched his attention from Megatron back to Megatron’s prim little conjunx. “Sure, if that’s what you wanna call it,” Impactor said. He relaxed back into the sofa, popped a jelly into his mouth. “Taught him everything he knows about using that hunk of metal between his legs. You can thank me for any decent overloads you’ve managed to get outta him.”

“Thank you,” Rung said, and took a delicate sip of his own nightcap while Megatron rounded on him and grabbed the arms of the chair like he was thinking of launching up from it. Impactor sniggered.

“But actually, I think it's more than half the time that I’m the one who spikes,” Rung finished, as he set the engex back down.

“ _You?”_ Impactor said. He leaned forward, elbows on knees, and grinned. “Don’t pull my leg, mech, I wasn’t built yesterday.”

“Is that so hard to believe?” Rung asked mildly.

“You’re barely half our size,” Impactor said. “Your spike’s gotta be a small as my finger.”

Rung sipped his drink. “Haven’t you ever enjoyed being fingered?”

Impactor scrunched up his face. Something about being asked that question by Megatron’s _conjunx_ was too much to unpack.

“Anyway,” Rung went on, “if you think all there is to spiking is girth, you can’t have brought very much to Megatron’s education.”

Impactor stabbed a finger in Megatron’s direction. “I made him _scream,_ you little creep.”

“Rung,” Megatron said, in a low tone.

“Darling please,” Rung said. “He’s allowed to say what he likes. Tell me Impactor, are your services in very high demand on the other side?”

Impactor smirked. “I’ve fragged the bolts off bots you couldn’t even imagine taking spike.”

“Did you serve them well?” Rung asked. “Did they take what they wanted from you and come back for seconds?”

“You—whadda you think you’re implying here?” Impactor demanded.

“I’m getting the sense that you think of yourself as a tool more than a participant when it comes to interface." Rung gave him a cool look. "If you think of your equipment as your primary contribution to an encounter, you’re probably accustomed to being used by mechs who know what they want from you.”

“I participate plenty!” Impactor snarled.

“Show me,” Rung said.

Impactor opened his mouth, and then processed what he’d heard again. “What now?”

Rung set his engex aside. “Show me,” he repeated. “If you’re really the interfacing authority you want me to believe you are, let’s see how you handle yourself.”

Impactor laughed, but no one else did. He looked over at Megatron, who was utterly impassive and had sunk back into the armchair to watch them both with coal hot eyes.

“You’re not really gonna try to frag me right in front of your conjunx,” Impactor asked Rung, although his attention was still pinned to Megatron across the table from him.

“Megatron doesn’t mind, do you, Megatron?”

Megatron’s gaze flicked towards Rung, but he said nothing. Rung just nodded, like that cleared up everything.

“Anyway,” Rung said, “you seem to think you can do better than him. Go ahead.”

Megatron’s dark hot eyes burned through Impactor’s armor. Something tightened up the length of Impactor’s spinal strut, something pricked at the edges of his sensory net. His interface protocols started to warm up.

“Alright,” Impactor said. He settled back, flashed a grin, put on a roguish knife-edged charm that had served him well in the berthrooms of Prowl and others before him. “If Megatron ain’t satisfying you, you can take me for a spin.”

Megatron had let his cheek come to rest against one of his fingers. “You always were so quick to draw conclusions. If you’d like to blame me for this, you’ll have to blame Starscream as well. And the rest of his stable of lovers.”

Rung tsked. “It’s not a _stable,”_ he said. “You make me sound like some kind of depraved noblemech. I just like getting to know people.”

Rung threw his leg over Impactor’s thigh, straddling the considerable frame with the kind of grace you only get from years of practice. Watching— _feeling—_ Rung grab hold of bullbars and swing himself up into Impactor’s lap was like watching the mech’s whole frag history in motion.

Like Impactor said, the delicate little high class bots weren’t really his style. The casual confidence, though—the easy sensuality of fingers wrapped around his bars—it spun his fans up before he could really think about it.

“Now,” Rung said, in patient but expecting tones, “where’s your spike?”

Impactor let his panel fold back. He felt vaguely that he should be objecting to this, because he couldn’t tell exactly what it was he ought to object about. He’d been asked for his spike before, no problem. Maybe it was the tone.

His spike shot out, harder than he’d expected it to, pressurized in an instant. It curved up through the space between them and rested tip-first against Rung’s abdomen, thick beside the petite shape of Rung’s frame. There was a flush of warmth through the metal where it rested heavily against Rung.

Rung looked down. He rolled his hips slightly, watching the spike bob between them.

“Well,” he said, “you may be the bigger one. I’ll know once you’re inside of me.”

Rung slid his fingers down the length, over the swell of the spike head and the bumps of segments below, until his nimble fingertips were pressing against the housing of the spike, the girth of it in the cup of his palm.

“Megatron,” he said, “would you be a dear and help me onto this?”

“Hey,” Impactor said, “I can lift you just fine.”

At the little push of Rung’s hand, Impactor slumped back further into the sofa.

“Let’s not tax your abilities,” Rung said.

Megatron got up and came around the table. He loomed over Rung’s shoulder, keen-eyed but silent, as he wrapped his hands around Rung’s chassis. Impactor wasn’t used to looking _up_ at Megatron, which made the view from the bottom of this all the more disorienting. They stared at each other, while Rung reached under himself and busied his fingers with opening up the plump little slit of his valve.

“Mmm,” Rung hummed, “that should be fine.” He tapped Megatron’s hand. “Go ahead.”

With barely a hiss of hydraulics, Megatron lifted Rung up and lowered him inch by inch onto the thickness of Impactor’s spike. Impactor, with his hand around the base holding it steady, watched as his spike sank into the soft mesh. Sweet pressure swallowed the head, and then the shaft, and then Rung had come to rest on his knees with a third of the spike not yet inside of him.

“That’s all you can take?” Impactor asked, aiming for cocky and coming out a little breathless.

“Be patient,” Rung admonished him.

See, this was why Impactor didn’t usually go for the small bots. He groaned and let his helm fall back against the sofa.

Rung worked his hips slowly, a hand coming up to press palm back against the flat of Megatron’s chest. His valve worked in smooth ripples, coaxing Impactor in deeper. His little face looked so pleased, he looked so pleased with himself—Impactor couldn’t help but press back for leverage and thrust up, hard, slotting himself to the hilt inside Rung in one go.

Rung moaned, and then glared. His valve clenched down on Impactor.

“Megatron, you’ll need to help me keep balance,” he said, managing to make it sound like a reproach.

A grey hand shifted down to Rung’s hip and closed there firmly.

It was hushed in the parlor of Rung’s home, except for the whirl of fans and the hard venting of Megatron’s frame, and the slick wet sounds of Rung’s valve demanding to be satisfied. The hands on his bars squeezed with every rocking motion.

Megatron watched it all, silent at Rung’s shoulder, taking in the once-familiar shape of Impactor’s assets. He had mapped them so many times, with his glossa and fingers, beneath the darkness of lights-out. He had always been so methodical, so eager to please, when they were young together.

Was Megatron thinking about it too? About the way Impactor had fit in his mouth, about the way their bodies had puzzle-pieced together, the way the hard and ugly life below ground had sweetened each clumsy tender touch? Once Impactor had fragged him on his knees, on their bunk, while Megatron mumbled out the poetry he had only just begun to memorize. Something about dust. Something about the dying light.

Impactor jerked up against Rung.

Rung hitched in the middle of a soft moan. Megatron narrowed his eyes at Impactor. Impactor’s spike twitched hard.

Oh hell. He was not into this. Of course he wasn’t into this. What was there to be into? Not Megatron’s piercing, analytical glare; not the feeling of being pinned under someone so much smaller, so much weaker; not the way he was being worked as if he was a spare Megatron had brought in to stud his needy conjunx—

Impactor choked down a noise and came without warning, way too early, pumping Rung’s insides with enough transfluid to overflow the mech's tanks.

He stared up at them both, too stunned and overcome with pleasure to pretend it wasn’t an accident. Rung had stiffened, his back arching, and then slumped again. Megatron hardly even reacted. 

Rung was visibly taken aback. His hand drifted down, to touch the spill of fluid dripping out of his valve and down Impactor’s spike.

“Now I know that’s not the best you can do,” he said, in a disappointed voice. His fingers came away glittering shiny.

A flush of dismay lit up the back of Impactor’s neck. He’d never done this before, he’d never—look, when he was fragging Prowl or whoever else wanted a piece of him, he liked it sure, he liked being close and being touched and he liked showing off, being the center of something, making someone moan for him, he liked taking a bot who thought they could use him to get off easy and putting them through the wringer, but—

“I’m not,” Impactor said, “now hold on, I’m not _done_ , don’t count me out yet.”

Rung gave his hips a smooth roll, valve working mercilessly, and gave Impactor another disappointed look when he flinched at the assault on his over-sensitive spike.

“Here,” Megatron said, “let me.”

And he hauled Rung up off Impactor’s spike, in a _shlick_ of something full becoming hollow, and set him down on the edge of the coffee table. When Megatron took Rung’s left thigh in hand and pushed it wide open, Impactor could just see the soft gape of Rung’s valve. The mesh was soaked with spill, transfluid and lubricant oozing from the soft hole.

Rung settled back on his hands and let Megatron lower his face in the thoroughly used array, run the flat of his broad glossa up the slippery wet mesh. Rung sighed with delight. Megatron licked up to his node, flicked it with the tip of his glossa, and then went back for seconds, burying his mouth between the folds. His chin and throat worked.

Impactor, sprawled on the couch with his spike half-pressurized against his thigh, realized in a rush of heat that Megatron was actively licking up the transfluid that Impactor had pumped into Rung. The growing wetness on Megatron’s cheek and chin, that was Impactor smeared across him. Each movement of his throat was him swallowing down the charged evidence of Impactor’s overload.

Rung rolled his head, lazily, and settled his gaze on Impactor. He reached up, pushed his glasses down on the bridge of his nose, and fixed Impactor with a heavy-lidded, knowing look.

“Don’t worry,” he said, “I’m sure that was simply an unusual accident for you. When he’s done, we’ll try again.”


	2. Black Hole Sun: Starscream/Rung + Empurata

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> zephuckyr was reading the empurata Au right after I wrote it and blew my fucking mind with the concept of “what if the terrible person Rung had sex with when he was desperate and horny was Starscream”. And I was immediately like, fuck, Starscream is the king of maladaptive hate sex. That could happen.
> 
> Spun off from [Corona of Light](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19812094), although not necessarily canon to it. You may recognize this from my tumblr. 
> 
> Includes degrading language and empurata-typical body horror.

Being taken by Starscream was like being screwed by a whirlwind. You might survive, Rung thought, but it wouldn’t be up to you if you did. 

There was nothing to hold on to, here. Starscream was all bared fangs and cruel lips as he loomed over Rung, two fingers shoved tight in the clench of Rung’s valve. With every thrust his knuckles slammed against the tender mesh, his fingertips curling to grind against a sensory node already at the sparking edge of too much. Rung moaned wretchedly, claws trembling where he held his thighs open, displaying his valve the way Starscream had ordered him to.

They had started out on the main floor, among the rest of the decepticons, doing their individual work. Starscream rarely spent much more time in the office than he had to, and so it had drawn Rung’s attention that Starscream seemed to be biding his leisurely time, half seated on one of the desks, his schedule in his hand. He’d looked up, met Rung’s eye, and sneered.

Then as Rung was passing in front of him, he’d reached out and groped the smaller bot, his hand roughly cupping underneath Rung’s pelvis. Rung had frozen, trembling with a barrage of pings from various internal systems, and when Starcream had squeezed him just as casually, he’d crushed his datapad tight against his chest and tried to vent air.

Starscream didn’t look at him again until the floor was almost entirely empty, but Rung felt eyes on his back all the same. And then, in the falling quiet, Starscream had swung up to his feet.

Against his better judgment, Rung had allowed the promise of hungry eyes and rough passing touches to draw him down into the predator’s den, where Starscream hit the door button and immediately rounded on him, marching him backwards across the floor. When they reached Starscream’s berth, the jet had pressed his palm flat against Rung’s spark glass and forced him down, onto his back, climbing up atop him without a moment of mercy.

Of course this was a bad idea. But somehow knowing it was a bad idea beforehand just made it harder to say no. At least he had no delusions about what Starscream was like; the viscous resentment lay on his lips like a gloss of lubricant, licked straight from Rung’s yearning, desperate core. Like what was slicked there now, from the first round of sucking and slurping that had left Rung dizzied and pliable in his grip.

Starscream had pulled his glossa free at the last moment, just as Rung was bracing himself for overload, and then he’d folded Rung back and told him to hold himself open, you do know how to do that, don’t you?

And then he’d gone back to it, not intensely enough to push Rung over the edge–just teasing the valve rim, leaving slow and searing licks up the curve of valve lips, until Rung was so lost in the tide of wonderful warmth and sweetness that his voice choked out a broken, “-Megatro–n…”

Starscream froze against him, fangs just barely clicking against the seam of a hip joint. Rung froze too.

Starscream’s optics were the dark heat of a smelting pit, molten rage boiling behind the inset glass. A gun to the spark could not have been more frightening than his fangs glinting against Rung’s plating. 

“What,” he said, his voice terrifyingly flat.

“I,” Rung said, “I’m–Starscream–”

“You want Megatron here?” Starscream spat. “Is Megatron the one eating your valve right now? Is Megatron the one who came in here and put his glossa inside your fucked up frame?” 

Rung shook his head slowly.

“Who’s giving it to you right now?” Starscream demanded, jamming three fingers into the swollen wetness of Rung’s valve. 

“You are,” Rung choked out.

“And who’s spike do you want?” Starscream said, with another hard thrust.

Rung scrabbled at the berth. “Y-yours.”

“You better not forget it again,” Starscream hissed, sinking the sharp fingertips of his free hand into Rung’s seams. “I’m the one fucking you. I’m the only one who wants your disgusting little gash, not Megatron.”

Rung made a noise that he hoped was affirmative. 

The stroking inside of him was so firm and so relentless–the nodes inside of him seemed swollen with the attention, abused and still hungry. Starscream pinned him under his stare, aware of every slight tremor, every jolt. 

If Rung could have bitten his lip, he would have. Overload was crackling at the edges of his sensory suite, building at the base of his spinal strut, promising him the numb bliss of relief.

And then Starscream pulled free once more, shaking out his hand to snap the strand of lubricant trailing from it. The clench inside Rung convulsed, so close to something it wanted so badly. Rung sagged, vents gasping for air. “Please,” he rasped, “I’m almost—please, I’m so close.”

Starscream pinched his swollen node and twisted, causing Rung’s back to snap into an arch and his arms to desperately pull his legs tighter against his midsection. The dribbling valve spread wider, but Starscream ignored it. He didn’t let go until Rung’s legs started to twitch desperately, barely stopping short of kicking.

“You get what I give you,” he said, drawing his hand back. “So don’t bother begging, it just makes you look more pitiful.”

Rung’s node throbbed, hot and bright in his array. Starscream traced the ring of housing where Rung’s spike had been, before they’d ripped it out along with his hands and most of his face. The housing was just sensitive enough that the light brush of fingertips sent shivers up Rung’s back.

“Open it,” Starscream demanded.

“What?” Rung said.

Starscream bore down against the closed spike cover with one finger. “This wreckage. Open it.”

The air pouring out of Starscream’s vents was superheated; his eyes were wild. Rung obeyed, irising open the empty spikehome. Starscream’s finger slipped into him, prodding around, until his downward stroke lit up something that made Rung throw his head back and choke out a moan. 

His whole array started warming again, faster this time, still primed from the last near overload. Starscream leaned down over him, bracing against his chest with a forearm, swirling the tip of his finger lazily against the hollow that had once held a spike. 

“Is it good?” Starscream sneered, “Do you like that?”

Rung’s mewls tangled in his throat, until he realized he was sobbing, desperately pushing up against the finger shoved into him.

Starscream’s lip curled; his eyes glowed hot. “Pathetic,” he said. “Look at you, so wet for it you’ll let me fuck anything. If I could fit my spike in this hole I’d fuck you and then come inside of it, and you’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

Rung wasn’t sure he would like that, but he wasn’t sure of anything at the moment except how badly he wanted to overload. 

“When I ask you a question,” Starscream hissed, “I expect you to answer it! Tell me you want me to fuck you, glitch. Tell me you want it whatever way I want it.”

“I want it,” Rung said, which was the truth. “However–you give it to me–”

A dangerous smile pulled Starscream’s lips. “Good bot,” he said, and withdrew his hand. He grabbed the crooks of Rung’s knees and pushed them over his shoulders, settling Rung’s array in front of his face.

“You think Megatron could make you feel this?” Starscream muttered viciously, jerking Rung tight against him. “You think Megatron would do this to you, you think he’d do anything but grind out one clumsy overload for himself and then roll over? You and your wet little valve, all full of transfluid with nowhere to go, you’d wish you had me then.” 

And then he bit down on Rung’s node, just hard enough to make Rung shout. His glossa left wide hot strokes up the cleft of Rung’s valve.

He ate Rung out like it was a military campaign, grabbing him with his teeth whenever Rung tried to arch away or push up into it, indiscriminately punishing. 

He ate Rung out until Rung was shaking so badly his plating rattled, spark guttering and flaring behind the glass. He ate Rung out until the whimpering turned into mewling, and then Starscream crawled up over him and thrust home into the swollen, pulsing channel.

“This is where you come,” Starscream snarled, “this is where you get your fix, you follow?”

Rung moaned, grabbing Starscream’s arms.

“You need it, I’m the one who’s got it,” Starscream said, his voice rough and uneven from the strain of pounding into Rung.

Rung had just enough processor power to feel a twisted kind of gratitude that Starscream didn’t seem to expect a reply. He couldn’t have managed one. He only held on tight, frame desperate and straining for the overload he’d been denied three times before, as Starscream forced his spike deeper into tight and tender mesh. The dataport started to twitch, aborted little half clenches every time Starscream slammed home against it.

“Lock me,” Starscream said, “lock me now.”

Rung looked up at him, onlining his optic again belatedly, and was caught off guard by the feral intensity of Starscream’s expression–his cruel fangs, his glowing eyes, the snarl of his mouth as he ground himself into Rung, demanding to be crowned the winner of some deranged game only he knew how to play.

Rung reached up, shakily, and took Starscream’s helm in his claw.

There was a terrible pleasure, in being the center of someone’s world like that. A terrible elation. An addictive horror.

His dataport cycled down around Starscream’s spike, and in the bare moment before overload cascaded through both of them, there was only the hiss of triumph turning Starscream’s mouth into something cruel and beautiful and impossible to refuse.


	3. Toy Seeker: Toxic Robot Masculinity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Originally posted on tumblr.]
> 
> When shapeofmetal was working on [this amazing art](https://shapeofmetal.tumblr.com/post/617476545624342528/this-ones-fanart-for-neveralarch-and) they were talking to Dez about Starscream’s frame changes in this AU and what the rest of the air force thinks about it and then I wrote this. It doesn’t really have a place in any of the fic we have lined up for the AU, but you can pretend it's canon to the main timeline if you want. Brief violence, references to sex, and robot gender role nonsense.

The apartment building was well-maintained and well-situated within the newly-restored city. The glass-encased elevator was classy; the neighborhood was good. It spoke of wealth and success, but it spoke in the even tones of someone who knew he was better than you but had no need to flaunt it.

It was perfect. Dreadwing might have imagined Starscream in a palace, but Starscream, as ever, knew better.

It had taken Dreadwing a lot of time and work to get to the point of standing at Starscream's door. You could even say his whole life led up to it. He’d stepped off the factory line into a world already shaking with the tremors of civil war, and joined the only faction that could boast the greatest seeker ever constructed. He’d spent the war idolizing Starscream, remaking himself in the image he saw on the posters in the air force barracks. Strong. Deadly. A tank with wings and a vicious smile. The true alpha jet, who subjugated all lesser beings under his pointed thruster.

Peace had come as a shock, but at least Starscream had come out on top where he belonged. Dreadwing hadn’t got much news, out on the far reaches of the front, but every Decepticon knew of Senator Starscream. When his company was decommissioned, Dreadwing had stared at his old, tattered poster of the air commander, and then hitched a ride on a merchant vessel toward Cybertron. Toward Tetrahex.

It had started with Starscream, after all. It felt only fitting that Dreadwing should end the war with him too.

It was a long space voyage. In Dreadwing’s more fanciful moments, he imagined what Starscream would say to him. Would it simply be the nod of a soldier to a distant comrade? Would Starscream look at him with an admiring optic, noting how Dreadwing’s solid frame emulated his own? Would they compare shoulder cannons?

Probably Starscream wouldn’t be interested in a grunt. Dreadwing had never made officer, never done more than amass a kill count and disciplinary letters. Starscream would look down his nose at him and ask if he was lost. It would be up to Dreadwing to impress him.

Dreadwing stood in front of the apartment door, the address of which he’d wheedled from a senate aide. He shifted uneasily from foot to foot, his bulk rattling and his wide (and carefully polished) wings knocking against the hallway’s walls.

He decided that even Starscream’s disdain would be a fitting end. He rang the bell.

There was silence for a solid five minutes. Dreadwing rang it again.

“ _Wait_ a _minute_!” shrieked someone from inside. A moment later the door was yanked open by a delicate little flyer, perhaps half Dreadwing’s size. Not a proper seeker, more… ornamental. He was painted in bright pink and blue, and Dreadwing could actually _see_ into his _hips_ -

“Did you _want_ something?” demanded the toy-seeker.

Dreadwing dragged his gaze up from the toy-seeker’s hips. “Uh. Is your conjunx at home?”

“My _what_?” demanded the toy-seeker.

Oh. No, of course Starscream wouldn’t conjunx a mech like this. Starscream probably had a whole stable of playthings, suitable for arm-candy but not for a true companion.

“I’m here to see your master,” said Dreadwing, more confidently. “The great war hero?”

“Megatron,” hissed the toy-seeker, and then turned and yelled it at the top of his vocal range. “Megatron! One of your delightful aft-kissers here to see you!”

“No, not Megatron,” said Dreadwing. “I meant—Wait, Megatron lives here?”

The massive shining bulk of Megatron loomed behind the toy-seeker. “Tell him to go away, Starscream, I’m in the middle of edits and—”

The world went faintly grey. “Starscream,” said Dreadwing.

“Yes?” said the toy-seeker, arching one delicate optic ridge.

“But,” said Dreadwing. “But. You’re—”

“Spit it out,” snapped what was apparently (awfully) Starscream.

“You’re supposed to be an alpha!” wailed Dreadwing. “You’re supposed to crush the unworthy beneath your pointed thruster! You’re not supposed to be some kind of, of, tarted-up buymech suckling Megatron’s spike!”

Starscream’s optics blazed so bright they were practically white. “He sucks _my_ spike, you defective airbus!”

“I thought you were _cool_ ,” said Dreadwing, deep in despair. “And you’re not even a _beta_.”

There was a flash of pink and blue, almost too fast to register in Dreadwing’s optical sensors, and then there were talons lodged in his throat.

“I’m _trying_ to finish my edits,” complained Megatron, as Dreadwing toppled backward, trying and failing to restrain the pastel demon on top of him.

“Are you two fighting again?” called someone else, from inside the apartment. “Please take it outside, if you dent the hallway again I’ll have to—”

“Hrrrghrr,” gurgled Dreadwing, as his voicebox was torn out.

“I’m the alpha!” shrieked Starscream, in Dreadwing’s face. His optics were two burning red pits. “I am! Say it!”

The pain eased as Megatron grabbed Starscream by one wing and dragged him up and off of Dreadwing. “He can’t say anything, you’ve ruined his voicebox,” said Megatron.

Starscream flailed and managed to kick Megatron in the shins. “Tell him I’m the alpha!”

“That’s a meaningless designation,” said Megatron, as he used one foot to shove Dreadwing back into the elevator. “In their natural habitat, cyberwolves don’t form the toxic hierarchical structures that—”

“Tell him you suck my spike!”

Megatron hit the button for the ground floor, and Dreadwing watched as the door closed, shutting away the argument and leaving him alone in the glass oasis of the elevator.

He was still bleeding.

Starscream had torn his throat out.

In the wreckage of Dreadwing's hero worship and worldview, there was only fact left standing: his scar was going to look _so cool_.


	4. Escape Routes: Timeline Bad Ending Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here you will find a sequel to “Suzerainity”, a fic in which Megatron, amidst the darkest part of the war, chose the worst possible response to being ghosted by his bf and then lied to Starscream about what he did. 
> 
> Zeph asked for this a full ass year ago and it was just NOT cooperating but I do have this much done. You may recognize this from my tumblr, if you follow me there. If I ever get as far as the actual rescue, I'll move it to its own fic.

After the announcement, Starscream removed himself from bridge duty, cut his coms, and made his way down into the bowels of the ship where only the foolhardy bordering on suicidal would dare follow him.

In the past Megatron hadn’t been above making the oblique threat while he held Rung sleeping in his arms. The three of them dirty and spent, Megatron’s fingers moving tender over the fine components of Rung’s little neck, and Megatron’s merciless hint of a smile as he said, “I can take him away from you at any time. Never forget that.”

One more piece of leverage. One more turn of the screw. But that was supposed to be a hostage negotiation–the promise a few years at separate posts until Starscream was sufficiently softened up, appropriately apologetic, willing to come bend his stubborn knee at the foot of the throne again. It wasn’t supposed to be this. 

Worst, that it didn’t have anything to do with Starscream, now that it had happened. He’d been on his best behavior for nearly a vorn now. He’d been sycophantic, almost, purring close and telling Megatron anything he wanted to hear, waiting for the inevitable 

When Rung had first disappeared, Starscream had gone to Megatron and let himself be fragged into the conference table, wings crumpling the maps in stacks beneath him, teeth digging into his lip as he tried to be triumphant. See what you missed Rung? I don’t need you. I’m just fine here, without you, and it’ll be you who’s sorry once you come crawling back.

It was good. He meant, it was fine. He could take a little rough handling. With the way Megatron had torn Rung’s room apart, ripping up the bolted furniture like so much shredded hard copy, Starscream knew he could be rougher. So it was. Fine.

And then when Rung came back, Starscream could flaunt how he’d been so busy, really, he hadn’t even had time to miss Rung. Oh, did you go somewhere? I didn’t notice.

It wouldn’t be long. Sure, he’d been talking about leaving since the night Starscream met him, but that was just what he thought he wanted. He’d cool his heels for a while, somewhere, maybe on a little resort planet somewhere on the other side of the galaxy, and run his little engine hot for a while, get some space. But sooner or later he’d realize that everything he’d worked for was back on the Nemesis, and then he’d come back home.

Nobody really left the Decepticons. You couldn’t. There was nowhere for you to go.

And then….. The announcement.

The first thing that gave Starscream pause was the sight of Tarn stomping through the hallways of the nemesis, like a dust devil ripping lightning and ruin over the Rust Sea. Starscream, himself, had been in a black mood, licking his wounds in the laboratory and soldering together a double barreled monstrosity that would take even Megatron’s helm off given half the chance. 

He’d been awake for three shift cycles, but he couldn’t defrag like this. His quarters would only be a cell block for him. And Rung’s room–just the sight of all the models shattered on the floor, the berth gathering dust–

Megatron had removed the door from the laboratory after the last time Starscream made something that turned out to be a weapon meant for someone decidedly not Megatron. Arming nascent coups and would be traitors was apparently an infraction that required the loss of privacy privileges. So Starscream just flooded the corridor with enough slag-melting exhaust to make any nosey glitches steer clear.

Tarn had passed in front of his lab, which was somewhat remarkable in itself. His heavy footsteps pounded against the floor; his shoulders were hunched, his battle systems were whining with the telltale effort of trying to offline. In the split second that Starscream looked up, pushing his hazard goggles up his helm, Tarn has looked through the doorway and fixed him with a gaze so malevolent, so molten, that it could have melted the components of a genericon. Then he’d lurched forward, and disappeared out of view, the fragging crankshaft.

Despite his best efforts, Starscream’s processor wouldn’t turn off. The squeals of metal grinding metal couldn’t even deafen out the running loops–no amount of scorched fingers of singed vents could break the grip of clawing, furious dread in his sublevels. He’d stood there, measuring lengths of coil, and all the while his blasted processor had begun to say, why is Tarn throwing such a glitch fit?

And he had fed copper wire into duct after duct, as his processor said to him, Tarn just got to rip the spark out of the only mech in the galaxy he hates more than me. Why does he look like Megatron just refused to spit in his mouth?

Despite himself, Starscream bared his fangs at the work table. “Not tonight sweetie,” he giggled, “I’m tired.”

He reached for the soldering iron. 

Tarn’s had a hate-on for Rung since before Megatron even brought the DJD together. Spark, strike, seal. 

It’s barely been days since Megatron announced the termination. Spark, strike, seal. 

Tarn would have come in his panels at the mere thought of finally getting his hands on Megatron’s pet moderate. Spark, strike, seal. 

You saw Tarn before the announcement too, didn’t you? Wasn’t he just as unpleasant then as he was just now? 

The second barrel slotted into the completed gun with a firm sharp click. But Starscream wasn’t even looking at the gun. He was looking at the doorway, and past that, into a cold and merciless universe, a dark and pitiless galaxy.

“He’s not dead,” Starscream said, and knew that it was true.


	5. Old Man Megatron Breaks his Hip

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written for Skylark because they were asking about h/c! This chapter contains minor injury and references to sex.

"Five days berthrest," said Ratchet. "And then a follow-up. Depending on how it's healing at that point, I'm anticipating another two weeks restricted to light activity before it's back to more or less normal."

"Don't be ridiculous," said Megatron, glowering from his seat on the examination table. "We're in the middle of rehearsals."

Rung laid a comforting and quelling hand on his knee. "Ratchet only wants you better, dear."

"My hip's not even broken," snapped Megatron, in no mood to be quelled. "I've fought battles with half my limbs falling off!"

"Yes, I could tell." Ratchet jabbed Megatron with his datapad. "Your frame's full of badly-healed welds and weakened transformation seams. Right now your hip is only hyper-extended, but if you push it you're not going to be able to heal naturally. You'll be looking down the barrel of reconstructive surgery and three weeks on berthrest instead of less than one!"

Megatron was glaring at the datapad. Ratchet took a step back, his vents flared wide and contempt in his optics. "But," he said, "if you _want_ to be a burden on your conjunx..."

"Fine," said Megatron. "Five days. Fine."

\---

_Day one_

When Megatron woke up, it was briefly as if it would be a normal day. Rung was curled on Megatron's left, his face tucked into Megatron's neck as he slowly rebooted. Starscream was sprawled on Megatron's right, his thrusters occasionally kicking against Megatron's thigh as he twitched through a defrag cycle. Morning light filtered through the windows, shining through Starscream's wings and illuminating Rung's inner warmth.

Then Starscream's alarm went off.

In the ensuing flurry of activity, Megatron found himself being yanked upright and his back cushioned with a few wholly unnecessary pillows. Rung brought coolant and energon to set on the side table. Starscream dumped a haphazard collection of datapads at Megatron's feet. Rung pressed a kiss to Megatron's cheek. Starscream stuck his tongue down Megatron's throat. And then, abruptly, they were gone. Megatron was alone.

Megatron scowled at the wall. Unfortunately it failed to provide entertainment, so he turned to the datapads. Useless. Trash. He'd already read most of them.

He checked his chronometer. Surely Soundwave would be awake by now.

 **Megatron:** I have some notes on Sixshot's performance. Be sure to incorporate these into the rehearsals.

 **Soundwave:** Good morning, Megatron. Notes unnecessary.

 **Megatron:** Don't be ridiculous. I'm just trying to help you transition into your new duties.

 **Soundwave:** Unnecessary. You should rest.

 **Megatron:** It's my hip that's malfunctioning, not my processor! Take the blasted notes!

 **Soundwave:** I already have a plan for the most efficient way to optimize every actor's performance.

 **Megatron:** You can't optimize art! Listen to me, I'm still the director. You can't take over this production even if your cretin of a cassette put those boxes right behind me in order to FORCE me to fall and FORCE me to REST. I will NOT allow you to

**This user is not available.**

**Megatron:** Soundwave?

**This user is not available.**

Megatron threw one of the useless datapads across the room. So much for _loyalty._

So be it. There were always other routes to victory.

 **Megatron:** Sixshot.

 **Sixshot:** Oh, hey boss. Heard you were laid up

 **Megatron:** Never mind that. I have some notes on your performance. These are NOT to be countermanded, do you understand?

 **Sixshot:** Uhh sure thing

\---

Megatron was boiling with rage by the time Rung returned to the apartment at the end of his shift. Soundwave had organized a dedicated campaign against him, leading every single mechanism involved with the theater to block Megatron's comm. Rumble had said something asinine about backseat directing. Backseat directing? Megatron should be in the front seat, both hands firmly on the wheel.

"Oh, my poor dear." Rung sat neatly at Megatron's side and curled a hand around Megatron's wrist. "You look so miserable. Were you very bored on your own?"

"Immensely," said Megatron. He curled his own hand around Rung's aft. "Luckily I have a beautiful visitor."

Rung tittered and gently peeled Megatron's hand away. "I don't think that would be conducive to rest, darling."

Megatron tried to look smouldering, then pleading, then, with a faint tinge of self-loathing, pathetic. Rung only looked indulgent and infuriatingly chaste.

This was a punishment. Ratchet had always hated him, and now he was conspiring to ruin Megatron's entire life.

"How's your hip?" asked Rung.

"Fine," said Megatron. His hip was the least of his pains, now.

\---

_Day two_

Once again, Megatron woke on what could've been a normal day. Once again, Starscream's alarm shattered the illusion, albeit a full hour earlier than yesterday.

But this time, Rung stayed curled at Megatron's side, even as Starscream tore the berthroom apart looking for his legislative notes.

"Wake up," murmured Megatron, regretfully. "You have to go to your shift."

"Mmm." Rung's optics flickered on and then off again. "No, I don't."

"What?" Worst case scenarios paraded in Megatron's processor. Rung had been fired. The hospital had been demolished. That maniac Ratchet had finally snapped and—

"He took the day off so he could stay and coddle you," said Starscream. He leaned over Megatron and coaxed Rung into a gentle kiss. "He's so sweet," he said, when he drew back. "Aren't you sweet, Rung? Much sweeter than a rusty decrepit fool like Megatron deserves."

"Don't be mean," mumbled Rung, optics still stubbornly off-lined. "It's too early to be mean."

"I'm not _decrepit_ ," said Megatron.

"Of course not," said Starscream, with completely unnecessary condescension. He tilted Megatron's chin up with two talons and dropped a kiss on Megatron's lips. Then his alarm chimed again and he was out the door, stuffing datapads in his subspace as he went.

"You took a whole day off?" asked Megatron, softly.

"Mhmm." Rung burrowed a little closer. "Wanted to keep you company."

Megatron realized he was smiling. He was glad that Starscream wasn't there to tell him it looked as if his face was malfunctioning. It was just him, and Rung, and their luxurious berth.

"I couldn't ask for any better," he said.

\---

They slept in late, and then Rung brought Megatron his morning energon. Afterward, Megatron certainly had ideas for keeping them occupied—after a full day and a half of lounging, he was filled with a nervous energy that needed release. Surely a light romp with his conjunx was exactly what the doctor ordered?

"No," said Rung. "In fact, it's the opposite of what Ratchet ordered. You need to _rest_ , dear, and I've never known your interfacing technique to be very restful."

"It can't be healthy to keep me on edge like this," explained Megatron, reasonably. "You're the one who told me that a lack of intimacy can lead to processor glitches."

"It's been a few days, not _years_ ," said Rung. "Anyway, I'm here, aren't I?" He touched Megatron's hand. "Is interfacing the only intimacy that matters?"

Megatron knew the right answer to _that_ question. "No."

Rung smiled. "Now, let's do something both restful and fun. What about a game?"

"Strip poker," suggested Megatron.

" _No_."

This was agony. It only got worse when Starscream arrived home to find Megatron losing at fullstasis. The ensuing teasing lasted through dinner and all the way until Starscream finally dropped into recharge that night. Rung had fallen asleep long ago, gracious in his victory.

Megatron, frustrated and in pain, was not nearly as relaxed.

\---

_Day three_

Morning light. Rung curled at his side. Starscream unconsciously kicking his thigh. What was once an oasis of tranquility was becoming just another sign of Megatron's miserable confinement.

But this time, there was no irritating blare of Starscream's alarm. Megatron waited uneasily for some minutes, and then finally reached over to shake Starscream awake.

Starscream jolted into action, rolling on top of Megatron and jamming his fist under Megatron's chin before his optics had even onlined. Rung made a sleepy whine as Starscream's knee shoved him to one side.

Starscream's engine made a few confused pulses as it tried to power up built-in weaponry that he no longer even had. His optics flickered on.

Megatron forced his voice to remain calm and show no weakness. "You're going to be late for work."

"Work?" Starscream frowned, clearly trying to access memory banks that were slow to warm up. "Oh. No. We're in recess for Primus' forging day or some other nonsense. I told Rung I could sit on you and he could go to the hospital."

"Five more minutes," murmured Rung, curling around Starscream's knee so he could cushion his helm on Megatron's chest.

Megatron smiled fondly at Rung and then glanced up to find Starscream doing the same. Starscream flushed when caught, and jerked his fist away from Megatron's throat. 

\---

Starscream was less attentive a companion than Rung had been. He had a pile of datapads to read and complain about, and little interest in bringing Megatron coolant or fluffing his pillows. In fact, Starscream had stolen several of the pillows for himself and was now reclining in his nest, gnawing on a talon as he read a proposed bill on musician grants to restore Cybertron's proud history of purposefully off-key wailing.

"It's not _off-key_ ," said Starscream. "It's _art_."

"That's not art," said Megatron. "Does it make you think? Does it make you feel?"

"Yes," lied Starscream, who had never sat still for any kind of performance in his entire life. "Anyway, I'm busy. If you want to argue about the meaning of art, find some useless time-waster on the intranet to fight with."

Megatron scowled. "What are you talking about?" As far as he knew, the intranet was only used for annoying city-wide announcements about planned construction and incoming shipments. He'd had it blocked for months.

"There's message boards," said Starscream, as if he was talking to a newspark. "Where people can talk to each other? I'm not going to teach you everything, I _said_ I'm busy."

"Fine," said Megatron. He reclined back into the few pillows he had left, and unblocked the intranet. Message boards.

Once he stumbled into the right directory, he found hundreds, thousands. There were dozens for every topic, rendered impenetrable by slang and acronyms. Megatron very nearly blocked the entire intranet again on principle before he found the search function. He searched _Prima's Exile_ , his favorite production yet. Perhaps there was a discussion board for reviews.

Five minutes or three hours later, Starscream tapped Megatron on the helm. "You need to calm down before you rupture something. What are you _doing_? You're venting steam all over the room."

"Some coward," hissed Megatron, "called my productions _derivative_."

"Oh?" Starscream sounded inappropriately delighted. "Send me a link, I want to see." 

Against his better judgment, Megatron did. Only moments later, he was rewarded with _giggling_.

"Weighed down by his own pomposity," cackled Starscream. "Civil war was preferable!"

"I'm writing a rebuke," snapped Megatron.

"You can't rebuke a _review_ ," said Starscream. "It's the mech's opinion! Isn't theater subjective?"

"This cretin has crossed the boundary from critique into imbecility." Megatron was already in the midst of composing. "This cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged."

"Fine, but you'll look like—what was the phrase?" Starscream made a show of checking. "A hide-bound relic of an ancient generation, who still thinks putting a crown on a beastformer is the pinnacle of radical art."

Megatron dispensed with words and pinched Starscream hard on the wing. Starscream yelped and elbowed him in the side. They grappled, spitting insults and searching for an advantage, but Megatron was hampered by his injury. Soon Starscream was seated on top of him once more, this time with his smug optics bright with victory.

Megatron's array experienced a small power surge, perhaps remembering that it had been untouched for an eternity.

"Someone's warm." Starscream leaned back, settling more firmly against Megatron's panel. "Did that review turn you on?"

"Don't be ridiculous," said Megatron, fighting not to buck up into Starscream's tease of a frame.

"Do you crave being humiliated by a sharp-tongued theater critic?" cooed Starscream. "Do you want to be called a bad, bad director?"

Megatron glared. "It's a completely understandable reaction to physical stimulus."

"Mhmm." Starscream glanced over at his datapads, now scattered on the floor. "I should go back to my reading."

Megatron grabbed Starscream's thigh. Starscream looked down at him coyly, his hips shifting in the tiniest of circles.

Megatron triggered his panel's opening mechanism, allowing his aching spike to pressurize.

"Oh!" Starscream shifted to allow Megatron's spike to rub against his own closed panel. " _Megatron_. You're _injured_. You need to _rest_."

"What I _need_ ," purred Megatron, "is for someone to relieve this... pressure."

"Well," said Starscream, pretending reluctance even as he continued to grind against Megatron's spike, "I supposed if we're _careful_..."

\---

"Three days!" yelled Ratchet. "You couldn't keep your panel locked for three days?"

Megatron hesitated. He could defend neither his will power nor his natural desire for intimacy, not when he was lying on his own berth with his hip literally in pieces as Ratchet stripped out the broken components.

"It's Starscream's fault," he said, at last.

"What?" squawked Starscream. " _You_ were the one who told me to go faster, don't worry about that creaking noise, you would be fine!"

"Starscream," sighed Rung, "I _did_ tell you that interfacing isn't conducive to berth rest."

"He was in the berth!" Starscream gestured at Megatron's prone position. "I was on top, he wasn't doing _any_ of the work-"

"I don't want to hear details," said Ratchet. He straightened, looking over Megatron's frame with a critical optic. "This whole assembly needs replaced. I'm scheduling you for surgery. There'll be a medical transport here in twenty minutes—I'd take you, except I'm not rated for your size class, and we don't need a broken axle on top of a broken hip."

"Thank you, Ratchet." Rung drifted closer, laying a comforting hand on Megatron's shoulder. "It was so kind of you to make a house call after your shift, we're really very grateful."

"Grateful?" Ratchet snorted. "I'll take your gratitude, Rung. But from _him_ ," he jabbed a finger at Megatron, "I want _obedience_. He'll spend all three weeks of his recovery at the hospital, where I can guarantee that there'll be no," he struggled for a moment, vents flicking open and shut, "no _hanky panky_."

Megatron sneered and prepared to deliver his rebuttal, but Rung gently clamped his hand over his mouth. "Of course," said Rung, demurely. "Whatever you think best."

Rung's hand remained while Ratchet slapped a temp patch over Megatron's hip and grumbled his way out of the apartment. Only once they heard the faint dining of the elevator did Rung release him.

"Well," said Rung. "I'm very disappointed."

Megatron scowled and said nothing. Starscream was slumped sullenly in the corner of the room where Rung kept his model kits, fiddling with a little shuttle. If he had any response, he was also wise enough to keep it to himself.

"I have been patiently denying myself," continued Rung, "because I knew that you would be recovered in a few days, and then you could pound me into the berth until my processor reset. And no sooner am I out of the apartment than you wreck your hip so badly that I'll need to wait another three weeks!"

Starscream perked up. "You don't have to wait! I can—"

"No," said Rung, firmly. "Three weeks."

Starscream's expression melted with despair. At least, thought Megatron spitefully, they would all suffer together.

\---

Rung's resolve lasted exactly one week, three days, four hours, and thirty-five minutes, until finally he broke down, locked the door of Megatron's hospital room, and rode Megatron's face through no less than three overloads. Ratchet was _extremely_ disappointed.

"I didn't even touch his hip," muttered Rung. "I'll strap him down next time."

Megatron experienced a minor power surge which unfortunately was plainly displayed on the medical read-outs.

"Please," said Ratchet, attacking Megatron's hip with screwdriver and grease, "never say anything to me ever again."


	6. Starscream's processor holiday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rung can be _very_ petty when he doesn't get his overload.
> 
> (Explicit sex, PDA. Set a little while after Apotheosis.)

The bad thing about being suspended from the senate pending an ethics investigation into his attempted murder of a suspect in the (successful but temporary) murder of his lover was—actually, just about everything. But the good thing about it was that there was absolutely no reason why Starscream shouldn't have sex in the middle of the afternoon. It was Rung's day off, after all.

Rung had one entire hand in Starscream's valve, and in the other hand he held a vibrator, rumbling gently at Starscream's anterior node. Starscream arched his back a micron further, luxuriating in the slow pulsing climb of his arousal. The soft covers of the berth slid against his wings.

"Don't enjoy yourself too much," said Rung, wryly. "I have plans for this spike." He ran a finger from the transfluid channel down to the base, then circling carefully around Starscream’s anterior node. Starscream choked back a gasp. He abruptly _needed_ , right now, no matter what the consequences.

He reached down to grasp the vibrator. When Rung didn't let it go, he simply moved both hand and vibrator together to press firmly against his node as he upped the setting to the max.

"Starscream," said Rung, but it was too late. Starscream tripped into an overload that was less like the usual earthquake and more like a series of waves, lapping over his circuits again and again as he clenched around Rung's delicate fingers. It seemed to stretch for an eternity. Starscream didn't even feel embarrassed about all the noises he was making, it was so good.

Normally after an overload any kind of touch on Starscream's node felt too intense to enjoy. But this time it felt like another surge was building, trembling at the edge of crashing over Starscream's frame. He ground against the vibrator again, and this time both his spike and his valve went off at the same time, covering his own stomach with transfluid even as he dripped lubricant all over Rung's arm.

He was panting when Rung carefully eased his fingers out. _Oh_ , they were soaked. Starscream whined and clutched at Rung when he tried to pull the vibrator away.

"Please," said Starscream. "Please, I need—"

Rung was frowning at Starscream's spent spike. "Yes, darling?"

"I need your fingers, _please_ , I'm so _empty_ -"

"Shh, shh." Rung's frown disappeared as he slid his fingers back into Starscream, stretching him taut again. "I've got you."

It was a harder climb this time. Starscream kept shifting the vibrator, trying to find that perfect spot. Once he even took a break from it entirely, letting the vibrator buzz against his thigh as he squirmed and fragged himself on Rung's fingers until he was panting and desperate for another release. He finally overloaded again with the vibrator clenched between his thighs and Rung softly rubbing inside of him, every cable tensed, the power surge so strong that it overwhelmed his optical sensors and left him floating in white light.

Then there was a fizz and a pop, and Starscream flattened on the berth as if his hydraulic fluid had simply vanished.

\---

"You popped three circuit breakers," said a warm, rich voice. "And your array is _entirely_ offline. I won't say it wasn't pretty, darling, but I do wish you'd thought of _my_ valve instead of just your own."

"Nnnnn," said Starscream. The world seemed to be made up entirely of light grey and purple blurs, except for the orange blur looming over him. He reached up to see if his optics were still there and found his mouth instead. Oh, it was wet. _Ohhh_.

"Processor offline?" said the voice. It had a lilting edge, like it was teasing him. Mean.

"Mmnngh," mumbled Starscream, around his own fingers.

The orange blur shifted around, and Starscream found himself with an armful of small, warm frame. He let his fingers fall from his mouth and pulled the frame flush against his chest, tucking its helm under his chin. Warm. Yes. Good.

"I suppose we can take a little nap," said the voice. "But you do owe me an overload, my love."

"Gghh," said Starscream. His optics had flickered off at some point, and it was so easy to slide into recharge. It felt almost as good as fragging.

\---

Some (but not enough) time later, someone shoved at Starscream's shoulder.

"No," said Starscream, preemptively.

"It's been half an hour," said Rung. "I don't intend to spend my whole day off lying in berth."

"Fine," said Starscream. "You get up."

"I _can't_ ," said Rung, "because _someone_ is pinning me to his chassis."

Starscream considered this. His processor was swathed in static and his optics didn't want to online, but it was true that his arms were wrapped around something that could, possibly be Rung.

Starscream's processor resisted further thought. He lapsed into comfortable nothingness.

"Starscream," said Rung, and when that went unanswered, he followed up by prodding Starscream's chin.

"Nnnnmgh," groaned Starscream. 

"If I'm going to be trapped here, at least we can be productive." Rung ran a finger along Starscream's neck cable. "You keep saying you'll schedule that check-up."

Starscream shook his head. The movement felt like it shook his whole frame, making his sense of gravity swim dizzily even once he'd stopped. He clutched Rung a little harder, just for stability.

"When was the last time you had an exam?" Rung began to stroke the junction of Starscream's neck and shoulder. "During the war? It'll be so easy, just a comm to that general practitioner Ratchet recommended. We can get it on your calendar now, before you're back in the senate and run off your feet again."

Something in Starscream's engine twinged uncomfortably at the mention of the senate, but it was easy to ignore when he felt like he was floating at the bottom of an oil well, at the end of a very long tether. He didn’t want to do anything that would lose him that feeling.

"Just one comm call," murmured Rung. "Can you dial for me, darling? Here, I'll ping you the frequency."

A message appeared in Starscream's foggy HUD, accompanied by a too-loud notification. Starscream winced and dialed the frequency purely out of self-preservation, in case Rung tried sending him any more messages.

Unfortunately, this resulted in an automated comm menu. Hanging up sounded too complicated, so Starscream put it on speaker and tried to find the controls to turn off his audials.

"Option two, dear," said Rung, and "oh, there's an appointment available in two weeks, that's perfect," and "yes, you can hang up now. You did _very_ well."

Starscream basked in the praise. That hadn't been too terrible. Now maybe they could go back to floating.

"Now," said Rung, his hand stroking Starscream's side, "why don't you give Thundercracker a comm? You keep saying it would be nice to catch up..."

\---

By the end of it, Starscream had a date at an energon cafe with Thundercracker and Skywarp, who he’d barely talked to since the war ended; three tickets for a trendy opera he'd mentioned to Rung last week; and a lunch meeting with Rattrap, who he'd been avoiding ever since the senate suspended him as a member. He'd also flopped onto his stomach and put his arms over his helm to prevent Rung from making him do anything else.

Rung's hands crept along the back of his neck, massaging the cables. "Darling..."

"No," said Starscream, his voice muffled by the pillow under his face. "No, no, no, I'm _tired_."

The wiring around his array was still pinging him occasionally. His array itself was still firmly offline, but the rest of his frame flickered with remembered charge. It would be so easy to let himself doze, to drift off on a sea of—

"Ratchet's coming over for dinner, don't you remember?" said Rung. "And Optimus, _and_ Deadlock. You did promise you'd help me navigate your energon distillery."

Starscream groaned. "Why'd you even invite them? Deadlock, _fine_ , but the Autobots?"

"Ratchet's my friend, dear. And isn't Optimus yours?"

Starscream didn't have the processing power to sort through what Optimus was, but it didn't matter—Rung didn't seem to expect a response.

"I do worry about Deadlock, though," said Rung. "He spent so long pining after Ratchet, and now he's rushed into a triad with the Prime… I do hope they're not taking advantage of him. Anyway." He clapped his hands. "Didn't you say we could make candied energon with your filters?"

"It's complicated," whined Starscream. "And time-consuming. And wasted on a, a," his processor refused to bring up the word he wanted. It started with an f, maybe. "On a Deadlock," he decided. "Wasted."

"We'll need enough for six," said Rung, ignoring him.

\---

"No," said Starscream. "No, you need it to be—to be—here, just let me do it."

"You don't need to do everything," said Rung, even as he made room for Starscream. "I'm right here waiting to help."

Starscream grumbled as he adjusted the pressure on the third filtration unit. It didn't matter that Rung wanted to help when Starscream couldn't summon the words he needed to explain how. He felt like he was fighting through a fog. And his frame was _still_ tingling.

He wanted to sit down, but candied energon was delicate and liable to burn if left unmonitored. He settled for leaning against the counter, occasionally reaching out to adjust the pressure in a different part of the distillery. Maybe if Rung liked the sweets, he'd let Starscream rest. Maybe.

"Are you adding magnesium?" asked Rung. "Deadlock likes magnesium."

Starscream resisted the urge to bounce his helm off the counter, see if he could reset his processor manually. "Seasonings in about fifteen minutes," he said, instead. "No magnesium. I want, um." He processor blanked again. "Uhm. The thing. The pink thing."

"I bought a whole shaker of magnesium," said Rung, reproachfully.

"Pink thing!" insisted Starscream. "The spar thing."

"All right, darling." Rung petted Starscream between his wings, and all his conviction evaporated like so much smoke. "We can do half magnesium and half feldspar. Won't that be nice?"

Starscream's helm gently tapped the counter as he bent forward to give Ratchet better access to the small plates over his spine. "Mmhmmm," he hummed, and reached out to adjust the pressure again.

\---

Deadlock sat uncomfortably, despite the cushion on his chair. Dinner. With his, his partners. And his boss, who was also Primus. And Megatron. And _Starscream_.

"Calm down," hissed Ratchet. "You look like you're going to pop a cable."

Deadlock tried, he really did. Frag, _Optimus_ looked calm, and he was currently trading war anecdotes with Megatron, who'd been the one trying to kill him in most of those stories.

He just—he didn't want to disappoint Rung. He'd had to come to dinner. He had to suffer through having his relationship examined and judged. But he wished to hell that Starscream wasn't here.

Starscream looked completely relaxed at Rung's side, almost mocking Deadlock's stiff posture with his own slump. His dimmed optics were staring right through Deadlock, as if Deadlock wasn’t even worth his attention. Did he think he was better than Deadlock, just because _he’d_ attacked two separate assassins on Rung’s behalf? Deadlock _would’ve_ done the same, given half the chance.

Starscream twitched, a flare of light flickering in his optics. Deadlock felt his lip curl, showing off his bared teeth.

"Hungry?" said Rung, brightly. "Have a candy. Starscream made them himself!"

Deadlock took one off the offered plate, but he stopped before putting it in his mouth. He sniffed it. Magnesium. Frag, they had to be poisoned. Starscream would never willingly give Deadlock edible fuel.

"We spent all afternoon at the distillery," said Rung, mistaking Deadlock's suspicion for interest. "Starscream built it himself! Darling, tell them about your distillery."

Starscream's helm jerked up, and his wings twitched. "What?"

"Your distillery," repeated Rung. "Tell our guests all about it."

"No," said Starscream, and bizarrely his sinister face transformed into a pout. " _No_. I'm _tired_."

"Yes, dearest, but—Oh!" Rung was interrupted by Starscream half-toppling out of his chair and into Rung's lap. "Starscream, we have _guests_!"

"Don't care," mumbled Starscream, laboriously hauling himself into a more comfortable position. His wings skidded across the table, forcing Optimus to reach across and rescue two goblets of engex that lay in their path.

Ratchet frowned. "Has he been like this all day? If he's experiencing sudden power drains, he should—"

"No, I'm sorry, this is my fault." Rung was almost buried under Starscream's larger frame, despite Starscream's relatively reduced size. He patted Starscream's helm. "I'm afraid I lost my temper with Starscream earlier when he was... unable to perform. I may have pushed him a _little_ too far."

"Unable to perform?" Ratchet looked confused. “Perform in what?"

Megatron snorted. "He popped a breaker again, didn't he?"

Rung's lips thinned. "Three."

Deadlock was pretty sure he knew what popping a breaker meant in this context, but his guess was confirmed when Megatron laughed.

"Three! His ambition knows no bounds. And you didn't get to overload once, no doubt."

Ratchet's biolights flared with embarrassment. "I don't—Look, I'm trying to _fuel_ here—"

"He's useless after he overloads," Megatron confided to Optimus, who looked faintly terrorized by the information. "Struts made of wet mush."

Starscream roused, his helm weaving a little as he raised it from Rung's shoulder. "Not _useless_. Made, made the, the things. The eating things."

"Yes, of course." Rung pressed Starscream back down with a gentle hand. "You did a marvelous job on the candies, darling. You worked _so_ hard."

There was a loud rumbling noise that set Deadlock's sensors on edge. What—Oh. Starscream's engine. During the war a jet engine that close had meant air support, along with possible strafing rounds of friendly fire. In peace time it apparently meant... whatever was happening on the other side of the table. Deadlock didn't want to examine Starscream and Rung's relationship that closely.

"Why does this keep happening," muttered Ratchet. "Every time I even think of setting foot in this place, it's just constant hedonism."

There was a small noise of metal scraping, and Deadlock glanced over to find Optimus shifting tensely as his optics followed the movement of Rung’s hand on Starscream’s helm. Optimus, perhaps sensing Deadlock’s attention, looked away and said something stiffly to Megatron, but Deadlock had already seen the want on Optimus’ face.

“You think Optimus wants to frag Starscream?” murmured Deadlock. “Or does he want to _be_ Starscream?”

Ratchet had unwisely put one of the maybe-not-poisoned energon candies in his mouth, and Deadlock’s comment came at just the wrong time. Deadlock ended up having to pound on his back until the candy finally cleared his airway and shot out to bounce off Megatron’s forehead.

Starscream dozed through the whole thing, a purring puddle of a seeker safe in Rung’s lap.


	7. Rope Test: Jazz and Prowl Do Bondage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you wondered what exactly Jazz had in mind for Prowl at the end of [To Be Securely Held](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18748198), then here you go, wonder no more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coming back at you with more Incredibly Specific Asexual Content. Contains discussions of sex aversion, negotiated predicament bondage, choking play that's safe because Robots, and one character realizing he's about to go way off-script from their negotiations. If you need details, just ask us.

For Prowl, it was all about the physical sensation.

Reminded Jazz—and he wouldn’t tell Prowl this unless he was trying to annoy the mech something fierce—but it reminded Jazz of before the war, chasing a high. Mechs he knew who loved the feeling of their gyros going loose and dizzy, the world spinning, the colors streaming technicolor through a pixelating display. Letting the input from your frame wash out your mind, leaving neutral, peaceful chaos.

The plating under Jazz’s hands thrummed, puffed up from the protoform everywhere it could. Heat bled into the cool air in rolling, heavy vents. Jazz liked this part. He liked all of it, for sure, but he especially liked the way Prowl’s frame felt when it was all worked up, when he was still testing the give of the knots. Before he gave in and accepted that escape was impossible. 

Jazz finished the knot at Prowl’s middle and threaded the rope down, taking his time, letting his fingers trace the finish on warm metal. The last couple knots would cinch Prowl’s modesty cover closed, keep it firmly in place, unable to transform open. Not that Prowl would want it to—he never had liked using his interface array, he said, not with other partners and not now with Jazz—but the security was relaxing. No temptation, no expectation.

Jazz had thought of that. Every time he watched Prowl relax into the finished rigging, he grinned a little self congratulatory grin.

He cinched the rope tight and Prowl hissed, not at Jazz in particular but at the sharpness of the sensation. Doors creaked at the strain from the rigging.

He’d gotten sort of ambitious this time. The web of red silk cable wrapped its grip around Prowl’s throat, just barely loose enough to keep from crushing his fluid lines and vocalizer—but the other end of that knot was bound to the tips of his doorwings, forcing them to strain into their most upward position or else choke Prowl with the connecting rope.

It was impossibly perfect posture, and already Prowl was trembling with the effort of maintaining it.

Wrists behind his back, so no help with balance there. Calf bound to thigh. Wrists secured to the floor, so no leaning forward to offset the pull of gravity. Pretty, pretty picture, Prowl all bent and squeezed, bumper pushed up and chassis on display. Jazz dismissed a prompt from his own interface system with practiced ease.

“Ain’t you just a sight for sore optics,” he said, setting his hands on his hips to survey his work. Prowl looked up at him, blue optics like molten silver, patient and waiting.

In the privacy of Prowl’s habsuite, that first time they’d talked about it—Jazz perched against Prowl’s chest, drawing secret little glyphs on the metal while part of him simply reveled in getting this far at all, after trying for ages to get Prowl to so much as turn his head—they’d talked about hard limits. 

“I have no interest in conventional interface,” Prowl had told him, “neither spiking or receiving.”

“What about fingers?" Jazz quizzed. "Is the overload part the problem or—”

“It’s the entire suite of sensory input. I don’t like how it feels.” And then Prowl had made a face, his gaze sliding a fraction past the edge of Jazz’s helm. “Or the… fluids. It’s uncomfortable.”

Jazz read between the lines. “Disgusting, I think ya mean.”

Prowl’s lip curved down in a grimace. “Tu—my previous partner, before the war, we tried interfacing. The tactile sensation of transfluid is bad enough that I seriously considered ripping the whole valve channel out. The whole process," he concluded, "was tedious and unpleasant.”

“So what _do_ ya like?”

Prowl glanced down at Jazz’s fingertips. “I like it when you touch me.” 

Jazz took him at his word then, and he’d kept to it since. If nothing else, Prowl was a mech who knew what he wanted. If he said he didn’t wanna go there, Jazz wasn’t about to question him.

But god damn, if Prowl didn’t look good enough to eat. The wings trembled, the cord around his throat snatched tight, and for a moment Prowl’s mouth parted to show his silvery glossa. The growl of Jazz’s engine revving startled them both.

Jazz swallowed, forced his engine back under control, and then offered up a carefree grin. The bondage had been his idea in the very beginning. It seemed like the thing Prowl needed, and it hadn’t occurred to him until embarrassingly late how much the whole thing would turn _him_ on in the process. He was going to do this right, he was determined to, even if that meant keeping himself on a mercilessly tight leash.

Jazz dropped to his knees in front of Prowl. He ran his hands up those bodacious thighs, plucked the rigging, stroked the back of Prowl’s helm to feel the sheer heat his fearsome processor produced. Jazz touched everything, greedy for the caged power and brilliance of Prowl’s frame. He reached around behind Prowl, grabbed a handful of aft, and pulled the mech closer across the floor, until Prowl was nearly straddling Jazz’s own folded legs, bent to the point of straining by the taut rope connecting his wrists to the ring in the floor.

You could almost track it as Prowl’s formidable computers started to slow, dropping one auxiliary program at a time. The whirring of his fans slowed. His optical lights simmered down to a low dark burn. His computers were calculating his ability to escape, over and over again, and running up against the same hard wall. Jazz was too good for them. Item by item, all else dropped away. 

Frag, it was hot. Watching Prowl relax. Knowing that Jazz was the only one who could do this for him, the only one who could beat the computers and give Prowl what he needed.

Jazz traced the edge of a door, watching it twitch away from him and twang the cable. Prowl made a little noise, hardly more than a breath, but even that was a punch in the gut for Jazz, whose HUD was starting to pile up with interface requests. 

“Gorgeous,” he said, burying his face in Prowl’s shoulder. The frame against him trembled. “Primus. I gotta—”

Jazz drew back and threw his leg over Prowl’s thigh, panel pressing tight against the thick knot there. He ground against it, working the pressure as his hands on Prowl’s aft kept him in place. Prowl’s optics had gone unfocused, staring somewhere past the ceiling while Jazz squeezed him and rutted against him.

The tip of Jazz’s spike, swollen against the inside of his panel, throbbed with each roll of his hips. Jazz gritted his teeth and buried his face back in Prowl’s shoulder. If he could pull Prowl closer, open himself up and pull Prowl into himself and _hold_ him there, a better bondage than ropes and cables, feel the exquisite silence as Prowl surrendered to that final gentle nothing—

His panel snapped back, of its own accord, and his spike pressurized in an instant against the top of Prowl’s thigh. Jazz froze, hyper aware of the transfluid beading the tip of his spike, cool in the air. Slag, what was he _doing?_ He had better control than this, what was wrong with him here...

Prowl made a stiff little noise, and Jazz skittered back across the floor, coming to rest a few feet away, fans at a frantic pitch. “Slag,” he said, “sorry babe, I didn’t—”

“It’s fine,” Prowl said, a little hoarse as his vocalizer kept trying to power down even while he was using it. “I can deal with it. You don’t have to stop.”

That cut through Jazz’s spinning processes. A vision of the future sprung up, unbidden but compelling. There wasn’t any rule against Jazz having his panel open, no rule saying that he couldn’t use one of Prowl’s thighs. He could rut up against it, spike slick on the heated metal of Prowl’s straining frame, watch Prowl tremble as he fought to maintain the position, watch Prowl’s face as he—

As he _tolerated_ _—_

Jazz pinned his lip between his teeth and pressed the palm of his hand to the tip of his spike. Once he manually disabled the spike protocols, it was possible to force depressurization. Just took a little effort.

“Nah,” he managed, “nah, I got it, it’s fine.”

Prowl watched him with those simmering dark optics, while Jazz slowly forced his spike back into the housing. It was a hard ache, the equipment collapsing section by section, and by the time his palm was flat to his pelvis Jazz was venting hard, his chassis almost shaking with the force of air pumping through him. His whole array was throbbing, but it was—it wasn’t—

He felt hot. A paradoxical shudder ran through him as he snapped his panel closed.

Prowl’s mouth was open like he was thinking about saying something, but no words came out. On closer inspection, his doors had dropped just enough to choke off both his vocalizer and his coolant, keep him silent and on the edge of overheating.

“Gorgeous,” said Jazz again, and eased back under Prowl. He licked his fingers, then reached up to play with Prowl’s headlight, watching little sparks make the jump between their frames. Prowl’s optics were so dim that they had to be in standby, and there was a fine tremor making his plating clatter. Jazz gave into the urge to slip two fingers into Prowl’s mouth. Prowl shuddered and his optics lit just enough to focus on Jazz’s face.

If Jazz could have _this,_ what was the point in pushing for something else? He’d keep Prowl like this until he was just past the point of failure, and then he’d cut the cord and cables, let them fall from Prowl’s frame while he smothered Prowl with cuddles and praise. Watch Prowl slowly put himself back together from where he’d let Jazz break him open.

Prowl’s doors dropped another micron, and his lips closed to suck on Jazz’s fingers. Jazz set an automatic program to dismiss any further interface prompts and settled back to enjoy the show.

Yeah. This was more than enough.


	8. Starscream and Megatron: subspace at the theatah

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What Megatron and Starscream were up to during Snapshots and Operating Instructions. Ft PDA, off screen sex, and an extremely put upon Soundwave.

Soundwave looked at Megatron. He looked at Starscream, huddled and sneering at Megatron's side. He looked back at Megatron.

Megatron attempted a smile.

"No," said Soundwave.

"Soundwave," began Megatron. Soundwave simply turned and walked away, leaving Megatron and Starscream in the theater's entryway. 

Behind him he could hear Starscream beginning one of his high-pitched offended rants. "Well, is that it? Aren't you the _director_? Do you expect me to grovel at his—"

Next, the clanking sound of Megatron hurrying after him while trying to appear entirely unconcerned.

"Soundwave," hissed Megatron. "Please."

Soundwave stopped, just so he could look Megatron in the optic. "No."

The theater had one inviolate rule: significant others were _not_ allowed at rehearsals. Soundwave had always considered it an important norm—he wasn't interested in navigating around a horde of Sixshot's 'groupies' every time he needed something from the prop storage. The transition from informal norm to extremely formal and enforceable rule had been a direct consequence of Megatron's own behavior. Rung liked watching rehearsals, and at first Soundwave had been willing to make an exception for someone who was quiet, polite, and occasionally gave incisive commentary on the performances. That willingness had come to an end after the Storeroom Incident. Soundwave was still finding dried flecks of lubricant on the props _months_ afterward. A velvet drapery had been thrown away entirely.

"He's not going to be sitting around looking pretty," argued Megatron. "I've offered him a part."

"Unacceptable," said Soundwave. "Starscream is your—" He hesitated. Conjunx was inaccurate, but paramour would be unforgivably dismissive to Starscream's eavesdropping audials. "—Lover," he decided, shuddering a little at the intimacy that implied.

"You haven't complained about Mudflap and Frenzy," said Megatron.

Soundwave gave him a flat look. He had, in fact, complained bitterly about Frenzy's entanglement with Mudflap, who was a lighting technician, whistled out of key when he thought no one was listening, and wasn't _nearly_ good enough for Frenzy. However: "They keep their love life away from the theater," he said. "They are professionals."

"And I'm not?" Megatron paused to glare at Soundwave, and then continued quickly before Soundwave had a chance to give his assessment. "I guarantee that there will be no repeats of... past unfortunate incidents. Nor would I ask this of you if it wasn't _necessary_. Starscream needs a distraction, Soundwave. The Senate ethics investigation is dragging on, and he's bored and miserable without work. Rung's death and resurrection deeply affected him, and—"

 _And it's my fault_ went unsaid, but Soundwave knew his amica well enough to hear it. Megatron had manipulated Starscream's grief, hardening and honing the edges of it until he'd created the perfect weapon of his vengeance. Now, with Rung alive and refusing to let anyone kill his assassin, Megatron was left with the consequences.

Soundwave allowed his gaze to be drawn back to Starscream, leaning against the entryway wall. His arms were folded, his shoulders hunched, and his foot was tapping with something that looked more like anxiety than impatience. He'd doubtless heard Megatron's description of his mental state, and it was telling that he wasn't screeching denials.

Soundwave sighed.

"Strictly professional?" he asked.

"Entirely," said Megatron. He reached out and briefly clasped Soundwave's hand. "You won't regret this, old friend."

"I doubt that," muttered Soundwave, but Megatron was already turning back to Starscream.

"Get over here," Megatron beckoned. "I'll get you a script download."

"Oh, did you get _permission_?" sneered Starscream, sauntering over with his transparisteel wings flared high. "You know, this place wouldn't even exist if it weren't for government funding. I practically _own_ this theater."

A gear ground in the back of Soundwave's throat. He'd _known_ he'd regret his moment of weakness, whatever Megatron said, but he hadn't expected to regret it so soon.

\---

At first, Soundwave was somewhat gratified to observe that Starscream was a terrible actor.

It wasn't, of course, that Starscream couldn't speak his lines appropriately. Neither could Soundwave quibble with Megatron's casting decision—the part of Liege Maximo in _The Betrayal of Micronus Prime_ might have been written for Starscream, if he'd been constructed back in the Electrum Age. The problem was Starscream's response to direction.

"What do you _mean_ , be more haughty?" he demanded, spinning away from a cringing Sixshot-as-Onyx-Prime to glare at Megatron. "Are you _looking_ at me? I've redefined haughtiness for a modern audience! If I could somehow reach a new pinnacle of haughty, it would probably start a chain reaction and end the universe!"

Someone in the theater groaned. Starscream didn't look away from Megatron, but his wings twitched. Soundwave had no doubt that the offender would be identified and handled with prejudice.

"I'm looking for more condescension," said Megatron. "Try to put yourself in his helm."

"His nonexistent rusted helm?" Starscream snorted. "I don't mind reciting a few lines and playing in the spotlight, but I draw the line at trying to possess a dead myth."

"Possess a dead myth," said Megatron, thoughtfully. "That's actually very apt, Starscream, well done. Even a cultural ignoramus can stumble on the soul of theater from time to time."

"Frag off," spat Starscream, and kicked over a prop table laden with fake energon cubes.

They bounced, thankfully. Soundwave knew better than to put breakable objects in the vicinity of not-quite grief-stricken and confused about it Starscream. He got up from his seat in the empty audience and began to gather the spilled cubes, waving away an offer of assistance from the detestable Mudflap. He shot a reproachful look at Megatron, and thought he caught a glint of embarrassment in Megatron's optic.

"Come here," said Megatron, beckoning to Starscream.

Starscream took a step back, arms folded, looking mulish.

"Don't act like such a—" Megatron stopped himself and sighed. "Come here," he said again, in softer tones. "Why don't we take a lunch break and discuss the character? Perhaps we can find mutual ground."

Starscream tapped his claws against his arm. "Where are we going? Somewhere cheap, I assume."

"We'll go wherever you like," said Megatron, through gritted teeth. "My treat."

Up on the stage, Sixshot looked incredulous. Megatron didn't _discuss_ characters. He shouted his interpretations until your processor rattled.

"If I sleep with the boss," he whispered to Soundwave, when Soundwave was on the stage setting the prop table back on its legs, "do _I_ get lunch?"

"Do not," said Soundwave, heavily, "even consider it."

\---

Starscream returned from lunch much mellower, a condition that might have something to do with the paint transfers that hadn't been entirely scrubbed off his inner thighs. Soundwave refrained from making this observation. If Megatron and Starscream _had_ to engage with each other so intimately, at least they'd kept it out of the theater.

He comforted himself with the reminder that it would only be a matter of time before Starscream stormed off in a huff and refused to return. The only question was how much property damage the theater would sustain in his wake. Megatron's relationship with Starscream worked because they had Rung as a buffer. When Rung had been... gone, they'd immediately descended into murderous chaos. Soundwave expected nothing less the next time Megatron tried to correct one of Starscream's lines.

"T'was ever so," said Starscream, pacing restlessly on the stage, "tho' the glaciers level the mountain and carve furrows in bedrock, a mech's spark cannot be so simply—"

"So easily," said Megatron.

Starscream puffed up, his shoulders rising and his plating flaring as if he was attempting to reach his wartime bulk. "That doesn't _scan_ ," he hissed.

"I'm sorry," said Megatron. "Are you correcting _Shakesgear_? The greatest playwright of the Cybertronian Electrum Age?"

Soundwave leaned back in his seat and waited for the fireworks to begin.

"Yes," sniffed Starscream. "It doesn't scan."

Megatron took a deep vent. Then he picked up his datapad and made a note. "You're right," he said.

Starscream froze. "What?"

"'So simply' is better," said Megatron. "Thank you. Can you stoop a little more during the monologue? We're trying to show you drawing inward, isolating yourself."

Starscream stood there for another moment, his optics searching Megatron's face. Then his plating clamped down, and his shoulders rolled forward, curving his back over his spark. "Like this?"

"Excellent," said Megatron, his optics flicking appreciatively over Starscream's frame. "You're a natural physical actor. Didn't I say so after lunch? You do remember what I said after lunch, don't you?"

Soundwave expected Starscream to preen and generally make himself an insufferable nuisance. But Starscream's optics only glazed a little as he nodded.

“You remember,” coaxed Megatron, “what happens when we work together?”

“Yes,” said Starscream. He shifted on the stage, his thighs briefly rubbing together.

Megatron smiled. "We'll begin the monologue again. From 'if society is a tempest, it is a cold one.' I know you'll do it perfectly for me, won't you?"

"Yes," said Starscream again, not defiantly at all. He sounded... hopeful. Like he wanted to be reassured.

"You're always perfect," said Megatron, his voice descending to a low rumble. "You just need a little guidance. You trust me, don't you?"

"Uhuh," said Starscream, his optics growing hazier.

Soundwave was beginning to think he didn't understand Megatron and Starscream's relationship after all.

\---

After that, Starscream took direction impressively well. He didn't argue, didn't sneer. He simply followed Megatron's orders as if in a trance, wings flicking occasionally as Megatron bestowed his unusually effusive praise. When the rehearsal was over, he tripped down off the stage, collapsing at Megatron's feet as if his strings had been cut.

Soundwave could hear Megatron murmuring to him in low tones as he guided Starscream to sit propped against Megatron's legs, rather than spilled in a heap.

Sixshot came down from the stage too, stopping in front of Megatron's seat. He folded his arms and cocked one hip in a pose which Soundwave was faintly horrified to recognize as an imitation of Starscream.

"So," said Sixshot. "Starscream's a pretty great actor."

"Yes, he is," said Megatron, not looking up from where he had Starscream's helm cupped in his hands. "He's an excellent actor. He always listens to my directions, because he can trust me to make him feel good. Isn't that right, Starscream? Don't you feel good?"

Starscream hummed a fizz of static, shifting to press himself even close to Megatron's frame.

"Uhh," said Sixshot. "Yeah. Seems like he's really benefited from your _personal_ tutelage. You know, I wouldn't mind working with you a little _closer_... Really up my acting game..."

Starscream's very presence seemed to sharpen, and he looked up at Sixshot. Soundwave acted immediately, more out of a desire to avoid auditioning a replacement actor than out of any particular fondness for Sixshot. Anyone who would proposition Megatron in front of Starscream deserved what they got.

"Aw, come on," complained Sixshot, as Soundwave hustled him out of range. "He's already got two mechs, I could be a third!"

"Find another way to get free lunch," said Soundwave, and shoved Sixshot definitively away.

He turned back to find Starscream bizarrely softened again, his helm resting against Megatron's knee. Soundwave had occasionally witnessed Starscream cast down at Megatron's feet. Every previous time had involved some kind of egregious tactical error or drastic injury, and _always_ a oppressing overtone of resentment. This was the first that included the pleased thrumming of a jet engine.

"Are you all right?" he asked Starscream.

Starscream's optics flickered lazily at him. No other answer was forthcoming.

"He's fine," said Megatron, his hand stroking Starscream's helm. "He's simply in... an agreeable frame of mind, shall we say."

Soundwave couldn't think of _any_ time when Starscream could be described as agreeable. Had Megatron drugged him? Implanted a processor control device? He was weighing the pros and cons of comming Rung for instructions on how to proceed when he noticed Starscream reaching up to paw at an incredibly inappropriate region of Megatron's armor.

Soundwave cleared his vocalizer.

Megatron startled slightly, as if he'd somehow forgotten that Soundwave was standing right in front of him. His hand slapped down on top of Starscream's, pinning it against his inner thigh.

Starscream whined and started reaching with his other hand. Megatron stood, scooping Starscream up with him. "Excuse me," he said, adjusting his grip as Starscream squirmed in his arms. "I just need to help Starscream... settle."

Soundwave stood there for a moment, stunned. Was Starscream... Really? Because of _acting_?

Then he heard the door of the storeroom closing.

\---

 **Starscream:** you _can't_ ban me, I'm the fragging star of the show!

 **Soundwave:** Other stars will be found.

 **Soundwave:** Preferably one with more decorum.

 **Starscream:** why isn't Megatron banned, then? it takes two to make a blow job, you hypocrite

 **Soundwave:** You were the instigator.

 **Starscream:** I was NOT, you SAW Megatron giving me all those compliments and telling me what to do in that sultry voice. he knew EXACTLY what was going to happen

 **Soundwave:** I was unaware that 'directing' is a form of sexual deviance.

 **Starscream:** hahahahahaha

 **Starscream:** you want to hear about what Rung and Megatron 'directed' me to do last night? maybe you'll learn something ;)

 **Soundwave:** No.

 **Starscream:** spoilsport

 **Starscream:** I'm coming back tomorrow, ban or no ban

 **Soundwave:** You will not be permitted entrance unless you can guarantee that no further interfacing will take place in the storeroom.

 **Starscream:** fine

 **Soundwave:** Thank you.

 **Starscream:** no interfacing in the _storeroom_. no problem

 **Soundwave:** ........

 **Soundwave:** I don't appreciate your use of emphasis.

 **Starscream:** ????? so picky!!

\---

The next time they did it in the box office instead. What was worse, they tried to be sneaky about it and Soundwave accidentally walked in on them. He truly could have gone his entire existence without seeing all of the anatomy on display. There had been some shrieking, only some of it Starscream’s.

Soundwave hoped the ethics investigation wrapped up soon and Starscream could be returned to his natural habitat. But at least Starscream's acting _was_ phenomenal (if somewhat glassy-opticked) under proper direction. Perhaps the play would go off without a hitch, if only Megatron and Starscream could control their base urges.

\---

In hindsight, Soundwave should’ve anticipated the Curtain Call Incident. The only thing that slightly soothed his affronted sensibilities was that Rung seemed just as shocked—although that might have had more to do with him being left in the audience while Megatron and Starscream… performed.


	9. Illustrations

[@Bonanza, Commission](https://twitter.com/bonanza_marco/status/1315824764410302464)

[Koroa, Commission](https://koroa.tumblr.com/post/614017931702059008/gold-boys-for-sauntervaguelydown)

happy timeline family photo, by [shapeofmetal](https://shapeofmetal.tumblr.com/post/617476545624342528/this-ones-fanart-for-neveralarch-and)

Commission, [Red-thedragon](https://red--thedragon.tumblr.com/)

[Aglet design](https://sauntervaguelydown.tumblr.com/post/190791208297/the-absolutely-brilliant-shapeofmetal-drew-this), @[shapeofmetal](https://shapeofmetal.tumblr.com/)

Aglet humanformers sketch [by Pumpkiin](https://pumpkiin.tumblr.com/)

[Starscream, Megatron, and Rung at 'their' wedding by neveralarch](https://neveralarch.tumblr.com/post/643391643472576512/starscream-rung-and-megatron-at-their-wedding)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some other arts from tumblr!  
> 
> 
> [ Baby Ostaros art](https://desdemonafiction.tumblr.com/post/623843457296973824/baby-technorganic-ostaros-with-his-moth-wings)  
>    
>  [Rung in his babydoll nightie](https://sparkmender.tumblr.com/post/618368689934417920/so-uh-starscreams-vacation-plans-whoo-boy-holy)


End file.
